Many might wonder why I continue to breakfast in cafés

Since increasingly I can’t tolerate the noise.

Why do Americans talk so loud? What do we have to say?

(An Italian told me that Italians are loud talkers too.)

I have been wanting to write a poem about June –

Not the month but a young woman I met on a train.

She was reading an abridged version of Madame Bovary –

As if to get from adultery to suicide more quickly?

Is the something about June the fact that after we get together

She’s silent – no e-mail or response to my e-mail

Saying that it was nice to see her, dine together and talk

About ritual and capitalism and the Chinese character for sex.

The loudest person in this café has just thanked everyone for coming.

Her companions are all dressed completely in black. What would you say has died?

— Poem and drawing by William Eaton